Timothee Chalamet‘s tremendous 2017 – which included starring in Call Me By Your Name and having a supporting role in Lady Bird, with both films critically acclaimed and the former leading to an Oscar nomination – has bled into 2018. He’s already signed on to star in David Michod‘s The King, and now he’s in talks to collaborate with one of the best working directors today.
Chalamet is in talks to star as the young nobleman Paul Atreides in Denis Villeneuve‘s new version of Dune, an adaptation of Frank Herbert‘s classic novel. The novel has had some contentious adaptations in the past – the infamous David Lynch version, the unreleased Alejandro Jodorowsky project – but Villeneuve is probably the best person right now to helm a new version.
He’s reportedly going to split it into two parts, which means the budget is expected to be high and could turn the film into an epic sci-fi event. Splitting the adaptation into two isn’t the worst idea when you consider the dense story and themes that populate the novel:
“Dune is set in the far future involving worlds beyond Earth, ruled over by competing feudal families who control access to a drug called Melange. Known popularly as ‘spice’, the drug gives its users heightened consciousness and an extended lifespan at the cost of crippling addiction and fatal withdrawal.
Spice, use of which makes interstellar travel possible, is found only on the desert planet of Arrakis — aka ‘Dune’ — and as such is the most valuable commodity in the galaxy”.
This is just the latest major project for Chalamet, as he’s also got a great chance of being in the Oscar race two years running, since he’ll be starring alongside Steve Carell in the highly anticipated Beautiful Boy, which sees him playing a drug addict in conflict with his father. That’s set to arrive Friday, October 12.
With that project, now Dune, plus The King and a potential Call Me By Your Name sequel in the works, we could be witnessing the rise of the next great movie star.
#Peace.Love.Dune
